Those would be the parts that are ignored when the real calender catches up with Star Treks continuity. Not always, but most of the time. You know, like I said in my second paragraph.
You seem to have missed the point of my post especially since you only quoted part of it which means you've got it out of context. But oh well, thanks for playing.
When you can travel faster than light to another star with forcefields surrounding your ship, and destroy an asteroid with a death ray, please come back and beam into my living room, or call me on a cell phone from the other side of earth without benefit of cell towers or satellites, and then tell me Star Trek is out of date.
Trek's datedness is part of it's charm, IMO. It won't be ruined by warp speed being invented tomorrow or aliens coming down from space any more than it was when Khan never took over in the 90's, or when someone somewhere first realized that there's no way aliens are all going to be humans with a few pointless forehead bumps. It's FUN before future history!
Nothing wrong with moving the setting forward IMO. The tech can be adjusted and explained properly so that it doesn't seem like magic. Plus a large chunk of the fanbase wants to know what happens in the original universe's time line. There's also the issue with the writing staff relying on way too much technobabble since the start of TNG. Babylon 5 along with most Japanese Sci-Fi Anime are generally technobabble light with solutions based on practical / logical things that people can do. Babylon 5 didn't have plots focusing on Tech failing. Another thing the writers need to avoid. Alot of the drama can be done with out reliance on Trek Tech to explain / fail / deus ex machina their way through the plot.
Forget the tech, what dates Star Trek are the cultural and social norms that are revealed by viewing - each series (as it should be) tells us about the time it was made not the future. Having said that - if you do consider the tech, Star Trek is a very 1950s view of the future even in its most recent versions include the latest film series.
I would have no problem seeing re-imaginings of any of the TOS eps. 2009 Trek passed the 'Shakespeare Test' for me... As for the spirit of the OP...I don't know...I'm still waiting for my flying car and jetpack.
Did Shakespeare have to adapt and change???? Of course it did. No one would go see a bunch of men in dresses, absolutely 1600's period, SHOUTING all their lines for four hours.
I won't see Star Trek as outdated tech wise until we start building anti-matter powered interstellar starships with FTL, artificial gravity, and deflector shields. As for cell phones can your cell phone use supspace to contact a ship in orbit without the aid of a tower? Modern tech might have some things beat in the looks department however.
People do still read old science fiction films and novels. Usually, they do it after they've explored and gotten bored with modern ones. Although instead of a rebooted Star Trek universe with the original principles and modern sheer, I'd rather see a completely new universe with the original principles. Or, heck, just have a show that's set in the same universe but not in the Milky Way galaxy. You can do whatever you want, have things look however you want, and then maybe later in the series when races like humans and klingons show up somewhere it can be an exciting surprise.
One thing I was thinking about at work today (as opposed to, you know, focusing on my job - we all do this, right?): A lot of modern television sci-fi seems to be of what I'd call the 'Buffy school' of show formats. No disrepect to Buffy, a show I loved back in the day. But it seems to have had a massive cultural impact. Most every 'genre' series these days is of that type, that kind of "Supernatural themes in a modern day Earth setting" format. I could only think of two traditionally Star Trekky-type "ships in space" shows in the last few years, those being nuBSG and Firefly. Even Doctor Who, admittedly a series which always skewed close to Earth anyway, is far less inclined to focus itself on far-away planets or spaceships. As a genre, science fiction has become much more grounded than it used to be. Is there a reason for this? Is it cheaper to film when all your locations can be found in real life, instead of having to build elaborate sets? Is Star Trek's format outmoded, as far as television is concerned? (There's obviously room for it on the movie screen). Or would it, in theory, stand out better now than it ever did before, as 'something different' in the context of (what seems to me) to be a fairly bland genre as far as televison goes at the moment?
Lance, for what it's worth, the Space Opera sub-genre of science fiction has always been a niche. It's hardly the sci-fi default or something. Not even in literature. During all the running time of all the Trek series, there have been lowly Earth-based series running alongside them. Some pretty good ones too. They're not some new trend. Keep in mind that it's only been a few years (2011) since the last spaceship drama was on air. Prior to that, they'd been running them continuously since TNG. Rumors of the death of space opera have been greatly exaggerated. Also, "only" Firefly and BSG? Exactly how many space shows do you think should be on in a given time period? They may not be "outmoded" as you've posited, but they've certainly never been cop-drama ubiquitous. They're a very particular sub-genre of genre television. It's like complaining that there aren't enough vampire shows (there are 3, FWIW).
Personally I can't focus on my job without being just a little bit distracted. I think part of the problem is that the sort of people who want to watch space operas are the same sort of people who download everything. So there's less profit in making stuff for us. And I think people are totally open to shows set in the future, but they don't want to feel preached at.
That's true, if by this you mean that there has always been plenty of science fiction that's not space opera. However, at least since Star Wars, it's hard for me to reconcile the pervasiveness of space opera in media with the connotation that a niche market be specialized and not mainstream. I still agree with your main point that it is incorrect to expect science fiction to be space opera, whether in literature or on TV. I recently did a re-watch of most of The Prisoner and was deeply moved and totally blown away.
It's true space opera has always been a niche in the scifi crowd, but it's the only niche capable of getting a mainstream crossover audience.
What about when we discover that you can't travel faster than light (you know, like now)? Or that a human/alien hybrid is just silly (again, like now)? Or that turning someone into energy in order to reassemble them someplace else would just create a big BOOM (once again, like now)? Leave Trek be what it is. If we require something to replace it let's have something new, like Roddenberry did back in the 60's.
Well, it likely serves as some type of antenna since not to many unexplored worlds have cell phone towers.